Von Miller's dream of helping kids is a vision. He provided 104 pairs of glasses for underprivileged kids Monday, spending two hours posing for selfies and signing autographs at Sports Authority Field at Mile High.What Broncos fans want to know is whether it was symbolic of a player whose old way of seeing his role and responsibility has changed after a season spoiled by a six-game dr...

As long as Von maintains his driver's license, sees the speed limit through his big specs, keeps the pedal off the metal, pays his traffic fines and/or appears in court, stays away from the dispensary, shows up for the piss collector, goes to work, loses the fifteen pounds and avoids the partying, I can pull for him.

Yet another article that tries to lay the blame on the defense...At what point will they do an article on why the coaching staff was unprepared and the high flying offense led by the future HOF'er was dominated...

HaleAndHearty wrote:Playing in the biggest game of the year, Denver's opponent had zero turnovers. And their offense punted once.

Since when is that not a defensive problem?

The Seahawks had two long drives in the critical first half, both ending in field goals. There were four third down conversions in those drives. Champ Bailey was directly burned in two of those conversions and he may have been primarily responsible for all four.

There were also two third down stops in those drives that forced the field goals. Those were plays by Duke Ihenhacho and Nate Irving.

The Seahawks also had a short TD drive off the first interception in which there was a 3rd down conversion on the goal line from a Tony Carter PI.

The Seahawks offense did a very good job of finding and targeting the soft spots in their 13 point first half. But they never drove the length of the field and put the ball in the end zone. Not once.

HaleAndHearty wrote:Playing in the biggest game of the year, Denver's opponent had zero turnovers. And their offense punted once.

Since when is that not a defensive problem?

The Seahawks had two long drives in the critical first half, both ending in field goals. There were four third down conversions in those drives. Champ Bailey was directly burned in two of those conversions and he may have been primarily responsible for all four.

There were also two third down stops in those drives that forced the field goals. Those were plays by Duke Ihenhacho and Nate Irving.

The Seahawks also had a short TD drive off the first interception in which there was a 3rd down conversion on the goal line from a Tony Carter PI.

The Seahawks offense did a very good job of finding and targeting the soft spots in their 13 point first half. But they never drove the length of the field and put the ball in the end zone. Not once.

It would be absurd to say the Broncos didn't have bad offensive problems in that game, and I'll never say that.

But when it's 43-8, they've got to look at all areas of the team.

Denver's defense needs more big plays, more playmakers, more turnovers, more 3 and outs. If they're looking to become world champs that is.

HaleAndHearty wrote:Playing in the biggest game of the year, Denver's opponent had zero turnovers. And their offense punted once.

Since when is that not a defensive problem?

The Seahawks had two long drives in the critical first half, both ending in field goals. There were four third down conversions in those drives. Champ Bailey was directly burned in two of those conversions and he may have been primarily responsible for all four.

There were also two third down stops in those drives that forced the field goals. Those were plays by Duke Ihenhacho and Nate Irving.

The Seahawks also had a short TD drive off the first interception in which there was a 3rd down conversion on the goal line from a Tony Carter PI.

The Seahawks offense did a very good job of finding and targeting the soft spots in their 13 point first half. But they never drove the length of the field and put the ball in the end zone. Not once.

It would be absurd to say the Broncos didn't have bad offensive problems in that game, and I'll never say that.

But when it's 43-8, they've got to look at all areas of the team.

Denver's defense needs more big plays, more playmakers, more turnovers, more 3 and outs. If they're looking to become world champs that is.

Again - one punt, zero turnovers.

Not a championship effort from any area of the team, in my book.

A team that has a hard time creating turnovers in their scheme, usually isn't very good at it when they try to force turnovers to come.

The defense was very stout and pretty impressive considering how the offense kept putting them in bad situations. That is, until the (notso)special teams gaffed on the 1st play of the 2nd half.

After the kickoff return, it was apparent that the defense was trying to create to's on nearly every play, thereby negating their season long usual sure tackling abilities.

The 2nd half got out of hand quickly, the uh-hum, adjustments (?) made at the half were wrong and the quick 7 by the Seahawks blew the game up and, IMO, empowered their already high octane defense to open the rush up even more.

I don't excuse any of it, it was a total team loss, from the coach's down to the water boy's, but in reality, the usually solid offense was the culprit in the loss. They didn't respond even one time to the adversity thrown at them from the second the ball sailed into the end zone on the 1st play of the game.

The defense was fine until things got way out of hand.

They didn't have to make a come back of that nature all season and the team as a whole looked lost by the end of the 3rd qtr.

The defensive additions and losses will only pan out IF the new editions and Von can stay healthy and out of trouble. ( Big "if" with Talib's history)

The biggest problem with the defense last season, again, IMO, was the lack of pressure on the opposing QB, something that was prevalent the season before.

While Phillips did a good job, he was pretty much on his own.

The key to the SB choke was the offenses ineptness, it was also the biggest shock.

The things we don't always see, that worry me are the effects of guys who aren't there anymore affect the team. How will they respond to and who will they respond to behind the scenes and on the field losing Woodyard and Champ?

Were they even the leaders?

I think Trevathon can be the leader, he looked to be one of them last year on the field sometimes. Who else can demand respect, not sure Von will...

This isn't about bouncing back.... It's about becoming who you were envisioned to be. It's about giving what you were expected to give. It's about paying your dues to the people who invested in you as their person to get the job done. If it is truly there, the sky is the limit.

One way to think about the relative strength of various units is to look at the range of possible outcomes for a given situation. This is a common sense version of win probability. When the unit was put in a given situation did they suck, were they great, or were they average? That's a summation of the outcomes of various plays.

Most of what happened between Broncos defense and the Seahawks offense was in the middle range. The Seahawks were executing cleanly but the Broncos defensive execution was also generally quite good. The Seahawks had the edge but it was a pretty even matchup except when the Broncos offense collapsed the field position.

What happened when the Broncos offense and the Seahawks defense were on the field was not anywhere close to average and it wasn't along the lines of trading blows. The Broncos had three plays that were way out on the edge towards the maximum worst possible outcome. All of those plays had an unhealthy admixture of self infliction.

There were also some sneaky little self inflicted wounds that set up some of those disasters. A Beadles tripping penalty led to the 3rd and 13 pick 6. A Vasquez offsides turned a 3rd and 4 into a 3rd and 9. That was followed by a failure to convert on 4th and 2.

In a game in which three of the four primary units were executing most of their schemes cleanly the Broncos offense was the odd unit out. It's not that they failed to execute some of their scheme, they went the extra mile to full meltdown.

There is a silver lining. The Broncos defense wasn't terrible and they have a good chance to get better. Some of the plays that we saw from the Broncos offense were extremely atypical. So atypical, in fact, that it's possible that some of what we saw was some kind of a freak event. How often has Ramirez snapped the ball into the end zone? How often does Manning try to float pooch passes over the top of encroaching linemen?

But I don't think you can ascribe the near domination of the Broncos offensive line to freakiness. That was more along the lines of a fanny whipping. Which is why all the improvements can't just be about the defense.